The first nine fights of in the UFC career of Charles Rosa may not have yielded the results and the record that he envisioned. Despite a less than perfect record, Rosa looks back on his career with only positive eyes. A handful of UFC bonuses, the most wins ever in his hometown of Boston and always being in every fight – Rosa wears each with a badge of pride. But more so than the accolades, Rosa takes pride in the process and development.
Having started in martial arts late, Rosa feels the gains he keeps making, even nearly 20 fights into his pro career, will lead him to his goal of being champion.
“I come from sports, when I finished college and played hockey in college, I didn’t have anything. I was kind of lost because I wasn’t playing in the NHL, so that’s when I found mixed martial arts. I found it at 23 years old when some start martial arts when they’re 6 or 7 years old,” Rosa said. “Now I’m just continuing to evolve as a martial artist.”
But while Rosa didn’t get the jump on martial arts as a child, he does feel he had a bit of an advantage over the average person when it comes to martial arts. Fighting is in Rosa’s blood – his uncle Tom “The Bomb” Rosa was a local toughman champion in New England. His dad and grandfather also boxed. And if that wasn’t enough, he certainly had the family dynamic to help build a tough guy mentality.
“Luckily I come from a fighting family. My uncle was a boxer and my dad raised me tough. We always had a punching bag downstairs, so I think that definitely helped,” he said. “Having two older brothers and two younger brothers, all chasing each other around the house, definitely made me tough.”
That family involvement didn’t end with a few run-ins in the backyard and a chase around the dinner table. It continued on into the world of MMA as Charles’ little brother Lucas joined him in the sport and in South Florida to train.
Although Charles might be more than a few steps ahead of where Lucas is in his career, the younger Rosa is a huge part of his training. In fact, being able to train with Lucas regularly, along with some unfortunate circumstances surrounding the pandemic, led Rosa to moving his training camps to American Combat Gym.
“It’s exciting to have a brother like that, living in South Florida, living the life with me and being able to share in those moments,” he shared. “That’s one of the main reasons with the American Combat Gym [move] – [I wouldn’t want] to not be able to train with my brother who I know is going to be a super star.”
And while he’s sure of his brother’s future success, that didn’t mean that Lucas’ amateur debut came without any stress on his older brother.
“It’s amazing, you know. At first I was really worried, before he ever fought, because you don’t know how it is until someone does it. Everyone says they want to fight, but then when they do it, you find out real quick if they’ve got it or not,” he said. “Luckily for Lucas, he got it. He’s got the blood… he’s a super tough kid and he grew up with me fighting him since I was a little kid.”
Rosa will look to tap into that familial toughness and his continued evolution this weekend. He takes on Justin Jaynes as part of the ESPN+ prelims on Saturday’s UFC Vegas 30.
You can hear the entire audio of this interview at 1:55.
